Permissions Help for ASCE Authors
Requesting Permission to Use ASCE Materials
For some authors, the task of obtaining permission to use previously published materials may seem bothersome, bureaucratic, and unnecessary. In fact, obtaining permissions is as essential to scholarly and scientific discourse as appropriately giving credit for the ideas and writings of other authors. The system of requesting and granting permissions helps publishers protect the rights of their authors and ensures the quality of the materials being published.
As the author of a work intended for publication, it is your responsibility to differentiate between the material that you create yourself and the material that has been previously published. Previously published materials—whether in print, on the Internet, or on electronic media—are presumed to be under copyright and therefore require permission if you wish to use them somewhere else.
All authors are responsible for 1) identifying materials in their works that require permission, 2) obtaining permission from the copyright owner, and 3) verifying that the owner is properly credited for granting permission.
Previously published materials that typically require permission from the copyright owner include direct quotations of text amounting to 100 words from a journal article or proceedings paper or 500 words from a book; tables; and photographs, diagrams, maps, illustrations, and all other types of figures.
As a reputable publisher of scientific and technical material, ASCE respects the copyright ownership of other publishers. We require that ASCE authors obtain permission to reproduce any material that is under a third-party's copyright. We also maintain a system to manage permission requests from authors who wish to use materials from our publications.